Thursday, August 28, 2014

Cottage Cooking Club August 2014 Two Recipes

August has been a month full of subtle changes. Farmers markets are overflowing with tomatoes and zucchini has been made into all things edible. It is also the fourth month of the Cottage Cooking Club that is hosted by the talented Andrea of The Kitchen Lioness. We are all cooking along with Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall's cookbook "River Cottage Veg". I prepared 2 of the 10 selected recipes and was once again very pleased with the results.

The first recipe I prepared was the Tahini-dressed zucchini and green bean salad. Here the salad is a mixture of raw and cooked ingredients. I loved everything about this dish except for how long it took to prepare. There were 4 different components, the tomatoes, green beans, zucchini and the dressing. The tomatoes will need to be prepared the day before or early in the day of your meal. This step alone will take 4 to 5 hours as they are slowly oven dried which will condense and intensify the flavor.

The zucchini is cut into coins and pan-fried with a little olive oil until tender and browned around the edges. The green beans are blanched so that they are crisp-tender. Finally the tahini dressing is prepared. This is the magical combination that pulls all these amazing flavors together. It is delicious!

The second recipe was the gazpacho. A gazpacho is traditionally a chilled Spanish soup that is made up of raw vegetables. Here the tomatoes were the lone star of the dish and carried the weight themselves. This is why it is so important to wait and make this soup when summer tomatoes are at their best. My gazpacho was crunchy from the cucumber, red onion and red bell pepper. The recipe called for two thick slices of bread to be added. This recipe was easy to prepare and loved by all. The soup was served with homemade croutons and a garnish of chopped basil. Bon appetit!

I followed both recipes very closely, but you could easily change out some of the vegetable combinations to make it your own. The tahini dressing would also be great on a lentil salad or drizzled over eggplant.

Cheri Savory Spoon

Mysavoryspoon was first started in 2010 as a way to journal recipes that I had collected from cookbooks, magazines, family and friends. Most everything was savory, using legumes and whole grains. Along the way I discovered a love for baking. Now a couple times a month you might see some type of sweet pie or treat.

I love that cookbook! Despite the amount of time needed to make it, I'd like to try the green bean salad. Every one of his recipes I've tried has been great, and I'm sure the salad would be no different.

I love the zucchini green bean salad with tahini dressing. I am tasked with bringing the vegetables to a cookout this weekend this would be perfect because my shopping will be from the green market on Saturday and tomatoes and zucchini abound.

It all sounds divine and inspiring. I especially like the idea of the gazpacho with crunchy vegetables. Perfect for now when I have 5 pounds of luscious tomatoes on the counter! It's great you've been doing this cooking club. Cooking can be isolating, so nice to share it with others...And with us. Thank you, Cheri.

I've never tried gazpacho, but I think I might need to try it now! Tahini-dressed zucchini and green bean salad sounds like exactly my sort of dish. I might cheat and use store-bought oven dried tomatoes though for a quick weekday take on it :) I'm loving this book, but I can't decide what to make first!

Cheri, your Tahini dressed zucchini and green bean salad looks and sounds fantastic! It seems the required extra effort of steps are worthwhile in the flavorful dimensions of depth each ingredient provides, then as they harmoniously blend together. PS- due to our temperate summer on the East Coast, our usually thriving tomatoes and zucchini's have not! Better make a farmers market run shortly, been too busy picking peaches! See you soon.

I agree that the tahini dressing was the star of the salad (and it was delicious with eggplant as you suggested). And you made the oven dried tomatoes! I'm sure they added lots of flavour to the salad. Your gazpacho looks lovely and refreshing - perfect for a hot summer's day.

I don't have any of his cookbooks but I'd love to get some. The salad with the tahini dressing looks so fresh and vibrant. It certainly looks like it's a great time for tomatoes and zucchinis in your part of the world xx

Cheri, thank you so much for participating again in August - so nice to read that you really enjoyed the tahini-dressed salad as well - I could not agree with you more, the delicious end result was worth all the effort that went into making this! And your gazpacho looks like a dream of a delicious late summer soup!Have a great weekend my dear!Andrea

Your salad and soup look so summery, Cheri. I would like to try the salad. The way you break down the description makes it sounds more manageable. I will try that one before the summer's over. This book has so many delicious choices!